Blind Moping Myrtle
by Cally Chloe
Summary: Myrtle gets new glasses and is teased by her idol, Olive Hornby and her friends. Deciding that enough is enough, she takes refuge in a bathroom on the second floor. A story of what really happened the night she died.


_A/N- Yet another one-shot for my collection. Yes, I have been having many ideas lately, most as familiar story points, but in another perspective. If I start to bore you, please feel free to speak up. _

_Disclaimer- I own nothing... NOTHING! Just thought you ought to know... (hehe, reminded myself of Quirrel...)_

She grinned widely to herself. Yes! Finally! After the years of straining to see the board from the back of the classes, trying to decipher the squggles that blurred together and somehow resembled words to her fellow classmates, she had them!

Triumphantly, she held up the new glasses that had been sent to her via her owl, Horrigan. Her father had taken her to the optometrist's to see what she would need, exactly, for her eyesight. Optometrists were muggle eye doctors. She would know, what with her father being a muggle himself.

Anyway, they found what type of glasses she needed, and then was allowed to pick her very own frames! There was a wide selection, and finally she had plucked up the frames she wanted and proclaimed that she wanted _those_.

The secretary for the eye doctor had nodded, and checked on her computer, (A relatively new contraption, sort of like a typewriter, but allowed one to search for things on a screen, like a television!) and told her that they would have to order a larger frame for her.

She agreed, because she wanted _those_, and nothing else. And if she had to wait the first few months or so into the school year to get them, then she _would_.

Twisting and turning her glasses, every which way, she studied them. Finally, she put them on, and felt elated at the fact that she could ow see the tiny little things she had never noticed before. Could everyone see the grooves in the wood on her four poster? Could they all, by looking out the high windows in her ravenclaw dorm room, see the individual leaves on each tree in the Forbidden Forest? Was this how everyone saw, all the time?! Gosh, had she been missing out!

She turned to Horrigan (And picked out each of his feathers, some light brown, and some dark, and some white, where they faded to a down-like-texture on his belly) and said, "Well? What do you think?" she asked him, turing her head slightly to each side. Horrigan gave a small hoot, and an owl-equivilent to a nod.

Myrtle could have squealed with glee, but she kept herself under control, for now, for she could hear the footsteps of her fellow dorm-mates coming up the stairs. She hurridly took off her glasses (frowning at how everything turned a bit blurry again) and shoved them back into the package they had come in, and in turn stuffed the package beneath her bed. She wanted her new glasses to be a surprize.

She had just straightened up as the girls strode in, led by the leader, Olive Hornby. Olive was Myrtle's idol. How she always got good grades as well as being the most popular ravenclaw in the whole school, despite her being in her third year.

She loved how the other girls followed Olive no matter what she decided to do. How they all respected Olive and how Olive was always willing to share tips on her own beauty.

Olive had that beautiful kind of hair that seemed to be all the colors at once. It was brown most of the time, but thick and shiny. As she passed by the lights and under the sun her hair would glow red, and after she came back to school from over the summer it was blond. And the hair was long, coming down to just past the middle of her back.

And Olive's eyes were the green of her name. They were a dull green, but still managed to captivate everyone from behind her own spectacles.

Myrtle had been hoping to be more like her by attaining her own glasses. And tomorrow, she would show _everyone_ how awesome she was with her stellar new glasses.

She had been dreaming about it for a long time now.

She would assure the other girls that she would catch up with them the next morning. After they left, she would put on her glasses, and walk down, down to the great hall where she would stride in confidantly, assuredly, and everyone would rush over to her.

"Myrtle, are those _new_ glasses!?"

"Wow, you look so great!"

"Look at Myrtle, everyone!"

The girls would beg to be her friend, would want her fashion tips and her advice, wanting her to tell them what to do, just like Olive. The boys would apologize, realizing that they were wrong to tease her, and they would que up and fight over her, all wanting her.

She smiled just thinking about it.

"What's got you so happy?" asked Stacy, Olive's second-in-command. Stacy had long blond hair that was pulled up into an elegant ponytail most of the time, and often had a few boyfriends at once.

"Nothing, I just got something from my dad." Myrtle said, pleased at how she could tell the truth and yet still hide the real truth.

"Oh, isn't he a muggle?" Piped up Claire, a dirty blond with shocking blue eyes. Her hair was short and curly, and brushed past her shoulders. Myrtle nodded, not detecting the slight disgust in her voice.

"Yeah."

"What did he send you?" Olive asked, and Myrtle was filled with a bubbling joy at the fact that Olive spoke to her. She wanted to keep going along with her plan, but she also wanted to show the girls... finally, she decided she would show them.

"Okay, but don't tell anyone." Myrtle said, and she bent over, reaching under her bed and pulling out the circular glasses that she had just gotten. She put them on, and pushed the end up the bridge of her nose.

There was a silence, where the four girls (a shy and quiet girl named Sandy stood in the back of the group) took in the glasses, before-

"Ha! I see why you wanted to hide _those_!" snorted Claire, sniggering.

"Is she serious? They're repuslive!" Stacy said, a look of shock and disgust on her face.

Sandy, in the back, still, stayed quiet, but she looked like she wanted to laugh too.

But Myrtle was waiting for Olive's reaction. The other comments didn;t even register as she waited with bated breath for Olive to say what she thought.

"Myrtle - has no one told you?" she asked at last, causing the other girls to quiet in their laughter and mock-gagging. Olive's voice seemed soft, but there was an underlying sneer to what she said.

Myrtle just looked at her blankly.

"Circular glasses just aren't cool anymore. It's the rectangles that are so much more in style." Olive said, flashing a pose and guesturing to her glasses, which framed her eyes in rectangles, the red rim looking fabulous compared to Myrtle's plain silver specs.

Finally, as though she couldn't take it any longer, Olive's face stopped repressing the smirk on her features.

"I mean, god, what posessed your muggle father to buy _those_?"

Myrtle blinked. "I- I picked them out. I thought that they looked cool..."

Claire gave another snort of laughter. "Cool? Well, I suppose you really do need those, you must have been blind!"

Stacy's nose was still crinkled. "Ugh, you've got that right."

"Myrtle, I didn't know it was possible, but those glasses make you even uglier." Olive said, -almost _purred_- at the delight of having someone to make fun of.

"N- no... no, They're cool! Who would want t- to wear _rectangles_ anyway!?" Myrtle retorted, trying to stay strong in spite of the tears making her eyes water and her throat constrict as though something was blocking it. Her chin wavered, trying to find resistance against the onpour of emotion waiting to spill out...

"Oh, poor, moaning, moping Myrtle." Olive said, and it came out as a mocking coo. "Go home to muggle daddy, get him to comfort you while you _cry._"

Mrytle clenched her teeth together. "I- shut up."

"Ooh, witty comeback, Ugly Myrtle!" Stacy said, stepping to Olive's side. "You're to dumb for ravenclaw!"

"Yeah." Claire sneered, coming up next to Olive on her other side.

"Ohh, poor _Myrtle_." Olive said wickedly. "Blind, miserable, moping Myrtle."

Myrtle broke. Her defenses broke down, her chin lost it's jut, her shoulders slumped, and she let out a chocked sob, the tears in her eyes spilling over.

She pushed past Olive and her friends, their laughter echoing in her ears. She wanted to think that Sandy had reached out to touch her elbow as she fled from the room, but it was too much to hope for. Sandy would probably just be mad at her later, for bumping into her.

Stacy and Claire followed her, and one (she didn't look to see who) shouted, "Hey look, everyone! Ugly Myrtle is _blind_ now, too!"

Taunts reached her before she could even get halfway across the common room. She could hear the words _glasses, ugly, fat, desgusting,_ and the worst part was she didn't know what half of those taunts were being directed at, herself or her glasses.

Tears spilled out, crashing down her cheeks and running over her clenched-tight mouth, to dangle from her quivering chin and finally drop, hot and salty, down onto her shirt or the floor. All before she could make it out of her common room.

She slammed the door behind her and ran, down, down as many corridors as she dared this late at night. When she could take it no longer, she ducked into the bathroom and closed the door behind her, so that no one could hear her choked sobs.

Big tears caught at the bottom of her classes and stuck there, and she wiped her running nose off on one of her sleeves. With the other sleeve she practically rubbed her face raw in an effort to brush off the remaining tears that had stopped their decent down her face.

She glanced into a mirror, looking and feeling totally miserable. It was a well known fact that Myrtle cried easily, and about every week someone tormented her to no end and she would finally break, usually in a highly populated area where everyone would tee her tears.

Her face looked as though she had broken out in a rash. Her face was almost deathly pale, but red in splotches where she had scrubbed her face too hard. Her hair was frizzy and hang lank at the sides of her face, in a boring, compkietly straight and middle part.

Her eyes were red from crying, and she could suddenly see how her glasses looked on her. They were big and circular, with a lot of glass separating her eyes from the rest of the world. She knew now how bad they looked.

And behind her glasses were her bloodshot, glassy eyes, still wet from crying. Her eyes themselves were a muddly brown. 'Poop brown' somoene had taunted her once.

And behind her race-like-face, a few marks where she had tried and failed to pop a few pimples stood out dramatically. Her hair hid most of her face for a reason.

And her baby fat still hung off of her cheeks, on either sides of her chin, making her look more fat than she really was. But staring into the mirror after being taunted, she could see all of her faults. And emphasized them more than necessary.

Her robes pressed a bit against her flat, yet still somehow chubby, to the rest of the student population, stomach.

Looking into the mirror, Myrtle saw how ugly everyone must think she was. How she wasn't perfect like Olive. With the sleek shiny hair and the fair, unmarked skin, and the beautiful green eyes and the perfect figure that her robes never touched.

This assumption made her burst into tears again, and she hauled herself into a stall at the very end of the row. Her tears splashed against the floor, the toilet seat, down her robes and shirt, and a few even plunked into the toilet itself. She felt so very miserable. She was living up to the taunts everyone threw at her. _Ugly Myrtle. Fat Myrtle. Blind, Miserable, Moping, Myrtle._ And it was all true, to her. There in that bathroom stall.

And this new wave of thinking caused her to break down just a little bit more, and her tears came faster now, and just thinking about how bad she must look right now kept it all going. It was horrible.

She wanted to hide. To stay in this stall forever and ever and never come out. To never have to show the world her face, her ugly, pimply, fat, face. She wouldn't do that to the rest of the world. She would just stay here, stay here and cry until there were no more tears left.

So she did. She stayed in that very stall for who-knew-how-long. She herself didn't count the minutes - or maybe, hours - that went by.

Finally, when her tears were finally slowing, she made an effort to wipe them away. She had realized she was being stupid. She couldn't just never come back out. She would die in there! With no food, and no water. Heck, she was _not_ drinking from the toilet, no matter how dehydrated she got from crying out all of her bodily fluids. It must be the ravenclaw in her.

But she couldn't go out now! No one could see her like this! She must look even more terrible than before!

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, she heard a voice. It was very close, and yet, she couldn't understand it. It sounded like strangled hissing. She wondered if somehow a snake had gotten in and she froze with fear, before realizing that there was a human sound to the hissing.

What got her though, was that it was a _boy_ speaking.

How dare a boy be in here! She didn't even stop to think what was happening. She deduced that they must be teasing her - but why by sounding like a snake? - but it didn't matter. She had grown tired of crying. She was going to unlock this door and give that boy a peice of her mind!

Or, at least tell him to go away.

She didn't stop to think. She pulled out the door bolt and flung open the door, her lungs filled with the breath needed to yell, but the yell never came out.

Her eyes locked on a huge pair of yellow ones, that made her blood run cold.

Literally.

She couldn't breathe. Her body began to seize up, as though tensing, and yet she felt herself blacking out. What was happening? Why was she blacking out? Who was the retreating back slipping from the bathroom? What was that _thing_ staring at her? Why was she-

Everything stopped.

In that moment, she felt all the pain she felt slip away. The feeling of helplessness, gone. Hopelessless, gone. The hurt and betrayal was gone as well. They were all floating away from her. And so was she.

But wait! No! Those floating away feelings reminded her of Olive! Of everyone who had ever laughed at her! How they deseverd to _pay_ for all they had done to her! All of these years!

And she suddenly caught on that she was floating away, literally, and looking down at her body, which had lost all color, and was now falling, falling, slow as a snail.

No!

Frantic, she tried to move, tried to claw her way through the space between herself and her body. She had to get back, had to! If not to just live, than to repay Olive Hornby!

And suddenly, she stopped. She stopped floating away and she looked down at herself to see if she had a body, and was surprised to see it. Translucent, yes, but a body none-the-less.

In all the panic, she had missed that the creature that had killed her had slipped away, unnoticed by the dying girl, back into the chamber that Myrtle knew nothing about. Tom Riddle had backed out as well, and was on his way, running - sprinting - back to his common room to ensure that he was there before anyone found the girl.

But in the bathroom, Myrtle let out an experimental wail. It worked. Her voice bounced off of the walls and her body had slumped against the ground, dead, her glasses knocked sideways and her hair sticking to the damp floor around her.

Myrtle smiled. She knew it should concern her that she was dead, but she had also come back. She was a ghost just like the Grey Lady, and she would be around forever. She could in fact live in this very stall for as long as she wanted to.

With a gleefull little laugh, she zoomed around the bathroom that no one would dare go in, in the future.

Oh, yes.

Olive Hornby would pay, indeed.


End file.
